income

For the first in the 13 years ATBS has been tracking income data, owner-operator clients broke $60,000 in net income in 2015. The 2015 $61,167 income figure is computed as an average among all segments.

When Overhaul launches in July, the company says, it will be debuting a fully direct-shipper booking engine to connect with owner-operators/small fleets whose drivers will gradually build trust among customers within the platform.

Though recent years have shown better trends, with pay rising fairly sharply for company drivers and independents alike, there's evidence from carrier surveys that such increases have now lulled. Lower volume expectations indicate increases in driver pay could be limited in 2016.

There's evidence that legal and other pressures could lead to more prevalence for a time-based pay model, particularly for company drivers. Should a state-to-state patchwork of enforceable labor laws be the way forward?

Readers' responses to a recent call for change to the 14-hour rule in the hours of service thread the needle through 30 and more years of American history and the erosion of the blue-collar middle class.

With the exception of 2014-15, pay evidence of a supply/demand imbalance in OTR truckload drivers’ favor is not found during 2005-15, during which a driver shortage was documented for nearly every year by one analyst or another.

The disconnect between the money and the mantra: As trucking has trumpeted a driver shortage over most of the last 10 years driver pay hasn’t risen in a way that would reflect such a strong labor demand.